Nigel Farage shock: he could miss out on becoming an MP

​​​​I wrote here earlier today about the sensational idea – planted by the Tory pollster Lord Ashcroft - that Ed Miliband could be ousted as an MP at the upcoming general election by tactical voting. As a result, Labour could win the election but need to find a new leader and prime minister.

Now the results of Ashcroft's new constituency polling have been released – and they have thrown up a further equally sensational idea: that Nigel Farage may have made a mistake in choosing to fight South Thanet and could miss the chance of joining other Ukip members in the House of Commons.

In which case, Ukip, too, could be looking for a new party leader.

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For his latest round of constituency polling, Ashcroft decided to poll constituents in each of the seats the three "opposition" leaders – Ed Miliband, Nick Clegg and Nigel Farage - will be fighting next May.

In Doncaster North, Miliband's Yorkshire seat, the Labour leader is on 40 per cent, 12 points ahead of Ukip on 28 per cent with the Tories a reasonably close third on 23 per cent.

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This shows considerable slippage since the 2010 general election when Miliband won by more than double that margin – 26 points. As Ashcroft suggested in his teasing tweet last night, if enough Tories were prepared to vote tactically for Ukip, Miliband could be ousted, leaving Labour leaderless.

Now that we have the rest of Ashcroft's findings, however, it seems the Labour leader might actually be the safest of the three.

In Sheffield Hallam, Nick Clegg is only three points ahead of the Labour candidate. "I would be amazed if the Lib Dem leader ended up losing his seat," says Ashcroft, "but remember he won 53 per cent of the vote in Hallam at the height of Cleggmania." Those days of Clegg being portrayed as the Boy Wonder are well and truly over.

Also, when Ashcroft asked Sheffield Hallam consituents what they thought of the current party leaders, they put Cameron first, Farage second and Miliband third. Clegg was not "placed".

Now to Thanet South and Farage's chances of being elected to parliament. They are not nearly as good as the Ukip leader might have hoped: the seat is a three-way marginal and Ashcroft's polling finds the Tories five points ahead of Ukip (34 per cent to 29 per cent) with Labour a close third on 26 per cent.

Currently, with only two MPs in the Commons, it is acceptable that the Ukip party leader should be a non-MP.

But if, for the sake of argument, we assume Ukip has a dozen MPs after the May election, and Farage isn't one of them, then there will pressure within the party to elect a new leader who actually has a seat - Douglas Carswell being the most likely candidate.

Are the days of the man with the big grin and the Bayeux Tapestry tie numbered?